Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Canard! Canard!

Ok, I have some pictures for you! I decided not to do a recap of the whole week. It would take too long and I don't think anybody would really be interested except for me and Mom. So, I'll just give you some pictures instead. Like I said yesterday...Mom took all of these.

This one was taken at the top of the Arc de Triomphe looking down into the staircase. We were standing up there trying to get a picture of the spiral when all of a sudden most of the lights went out. Mom whirled around, thinking that I had backed into a lightswitch or something. Nope, wasn't me. Turns out the whole thing lost power. We got to stay up there for maybe 10 minutes before all the guards came around and said that they were closing and we had to leave. Man, that was disappointing. At least she got this picture. She did take a couple from the top, but I like this one the best.

No, I'm not taking a picture of my hand. It's called bracketing. And it looks funny.

I know I look really pissed off here, but really I wasn't. She caught me right when I turned around to give her the cone and I wasn't expecting her to be taking a picture. Oops.

Ok this was definitely one of the most hilarious things we saw all week. We were shooting at the Palais Royal gardens near a big fountain. While we were there, a few little kids showed up with their grandparents. This little girl noticed the ducks in the fountain. She started to lean over the water and shout at the ducks, trying to get them to come over to her. She just kept yelling "Canard!! Canard!!!" (Duck!! Duck!!!). Needless to say, the ducks didn't really want to go see her. She didn't care. She just followed them around the fountain, yelling at the top of her lungs. Maybe you had to be there, but trust me, it was hilarious.

Mom's drug of choice. Normal coffee (essentially coffee that's not espresso) is a little hard to come by in France, especially if you want a cup to go. We went to this cafe near our hotel and Mom thought it was the cutest thing ever. Of course it pretty much was, and I love this shot. PS - just because the croissants are sitting in a basket on your table does not mean they're free.

And I think that's all your getting for now. I took a lot of the same shots that Mom did and hers came out well, so I'm really excited to see mine. I just won't think too much about how much it's going to cost me to get all the rolls developed. At least I'm just getting negs and not actual prints. I think right now I'm going to do some yoga. I'm sooo stiff from walking around so much last week, paradoxically. I think it actually had less to do with the walking and more to do with carrying my bag or my backpack (full of camera stuff) all week. Plus I just feel so groggy today. I went for a brief walk (really brief, only half an hour) this afternoon, hoping the fresh air would wake me up a bit. It didn't. The next step is doing some yoga. I have some pics from last week that I'd like to scrap after dinner, if I get around to it. I don't see any reason why I wouldn't. I'm actually getting back on the Artist's Way bandwagon today, and it turns out that I'm jumping right back into the week of reading deprivation. That means no reading other people's blogs, no going on scrap sites, no reading magazines. I'm on vacation - I should be finding ways to amuse myself other than filling my head with stuff other people have written. I'm actually doing a solo daytrip on Thursday to Troyes, a medieval type town that has 3 outlet malls on its outskirts. Woohoo!! I badly need some new shoes. Plus I have a lot of low self-esteem outfits in my closet that I'd really like to replace. Yes, Will, I will be replacing them, not adding to them. What with the costs of bringing my luggage to Germany I'll have to pitch old clothes as I buy new ones. But I digress! I must do some yoga now.